Should you have some liposuction with your tummy tuck?

A lot of people assume that a tummy tuck and a liposuction procedure are one and the same. In a nutshell, they aren’t.

A standard tummy tuck procedure is geared towards people who have lost an excessive amount of weight or want to restore their pre-pregnancy shape, and it mainly addresses saggy skin and weakened muscles. While liposuction can also address skin sagginess, its main role is to remove fat. If you want to tighten your stomach muscles, restore your natural, taut shape and remove fat, there isn’t an all-in-one treatment: if you want all three results, mixing in a lipo procedure is essential. It’s known in the trade as a lipoabdominoplasty, and it’s easier to perform than you think.

What happens during liposuction

The liposuction procedure is simple enough: a small incision is made in the targeted area, and a cannula – a hollow metal tube, attached to a suction pump – is inserted. Then, the requisite amounts of fat cells are sucked out, in order to achieve a smoother and more even appearance. The incisions are then sutured.

The lipo stigma doesn’t exist

There’s a general misconception about liposuction: that it’s a procedure only to be used in cases of extreme obesity, or as a vanity project for people who want to suck away weight without putting in the effort themselves. However, lipo typically isn’t suitable for patients that are extremely overweight and should never be seen as a weight loss procedure. It is a procedure designed to improve body shape and remove small pockets of fat that are resistant to diet and exercise.

There are two main benefits to having both procedures done at the same time. Firstly, your practitioner can do one treatment while performing the other without having to do much else, meaning all your issues can be dealt with in one procedure – without complicating your recovery period. In actual fact, when you have lipo too, the practitioner can eliminate the need for post-surgical drains by deploying a layered suture process, which can actually speed up the recovery process.